


Distractions

by iminshockivegotablanket



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Fluff, Kissing, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-20
Updated: 2018-03-20
Packaged: 2019-04-04 23:12:37
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,918
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14030928
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/iminshockivegotablanket/pseuds/iminshockivegotablanket
Summary: Sherlock is bored. (When is he not?)





	Distractions

John stared into the refrigerator for a solid ten seconds, and then very slowly closed it. He leaned his head against the door, feeling the cold against his forehead, and took a deep breath.

“Sherlock,” he said, keeping his voice steady (as much as he could, anyways), “do you really need to keep that in the fridge?”

“What?” Sherlock glanced up from his laptop. “Oh. Of course I do. Unless you want it to decompose in the living room. If you wouldn’t mind the smell…”

“Nevermind,” John quickly cut in before Sherlock could expand on that thought. “Just—could you—”

Sherlock bore his eyes into John’s with an “I’m listening” look. John blinked and tried to rearrange his thoughts into a more logical order.

“Could you not put it right on the middle shelf?” he managed. “It’s, er. A bit alarming.”

A faint smile played on Sherlock’s lips. _“That’s_ alarming?”

“Yeah, well, it is when I’m just trying to get the milk.” John opened the refrigerator door again, stared into it for another few seconds, and then sighed. “Couldn’t you, I dunno. Keep them in the crisper drawer instead?”

“But that’s where I keep—” Sherlock suddenly stopped talking.

John realized that he hadn’t checked the crisper drawer (or, more specifically, the contents of the crisper drawer) in quite a while. “What?”

“Nothing,” Sherlock said quickly.

Seriously considering whether or not a mini fridge would be a good investment, John bent over and opened the crisper drawer.

He stared for a considerably longer amount of time than he did before.

“It’s for research,” Sherlock said, sounding uncertain.

“Research,” John repeated dully.

“Yes,” Sherlock said, slightly haughtily now, “what else would it be for?”

John shrugged. “Who knows, with Sherlock Holmes?”

Sherlock looked at him, eyebrows twitched together, mouth slightly pursed. “What do you mean, _Sherlock Holmes?_ ”

John glared. “You bloody know what I mean.”

Sherlock shrugged and resumed typing on his laptop.

John turned back to the refrigerator, rearranging a few things around. Well, more than a few, but Sherlock didn’t need to know that. He made a mental note to buy air fresheners the next time he went for groceries. Dear lord, did that drawer stink.

After the fridge was cleaned (to the best of his abilities), John began taking dishes and placing them into the sink, trying to clear some of the disaster that was the dining table.  

He grabbed a blue china plate with a smear of jam and crumbs of toast scattered around.

“NO!” Sherlock cried out, so loud and anguished that John immediately jerked, fingers twitching, and dropped the plate.

It fell in slow motion onto the floor. Time resumed its normal pace as it smashed right over John’s bare feet.

 _“Fuck!”_ John jumped out of the way about three seconds too late. A stinging pain erupted over his feet. He hopped around uselessly, cursing black and blue.

Sherlock was right beside him, his face a mask of urgency and alarm. His eyes went to John’s feet—and then immediately glazed over them and passed onto the shards of the plate that were lying, broken, on the kitchen floor.

“John,” Sherlock said chastisingly, “you broke my favourite plate.”

John was too busy inspecting the shards of ceramic lodged into his feet to worry about Sherlock’s favourite plate. He staggered over to the side and braced his hands against the counter, trying to take some pressure off of his feet, and then gave up and hoisted himself up onto the counter, twisting around to sit down. He lifted his feet for inspection.

“Damn,” he hissed, watching as the blood trickled out through the cuts. There were two jagged pieces stuck on his right foot, awkward and prominent, and very much painful. He reached over, gripped the bigger one of the two, and pulled.

Sherlock glanced over at John’s renewed (and revamped) string of swears. “You’re bleeding,” he said with a mild tone of surprise.

“Really? I hadn’t noticed,” John gritted out, tossing the piece of broken china plate at Sherlock. It hit his chest and then fell down, joining the other pieces on the floor.

The blood dripped off his feet, the bright red brilliant against the dirty cream white of the kitchen floor.

Sherlock blinked, and then uncoiled like a spring. He fell to his knees, quickly pulling out the second piece (earning another hiss of pain from John), then dashed over to grab a towel from the oven handle, wrapping it around John’s foot.

“Stay,” he commanded (like John was going anywhere anytime soon), and disappeared around the corner.

A moment later he returned with a handful of alcohol wipes. He lowered himself to his knees and tore open a package.

“Sherlock,” John began, but he didn’t seem to hear him.

Sherlock’s hand hovered above the cuts. “It’s going to sting,” he said.

“Yeah, of course it’s going to sting,” John said. “It’s fine.”

Sherlock hesitated for another moment, and then dabbed at the cuts with a gentleness John didn’t think he possessed. His lips pressed tight, his eyebrows slightly furrowed—all his attention directed to John.

“Alright?” Sherlock said quietly. John shook himself out of a bit of a daze: he hadn’t even felt the pain.

“Er, um. That should be good, I’ll be fine. It’s just a small cut,” John said, scratching the back of his head. “Best clean up the mess.”

Sherlock nodded. He stood up and grabbed the small dustpan they (John) kept in the back corner of the kitchen. John watched him fuss around, sweeping and wiping, with a curiosity he didn’t bother to conceal.

When he was done, Sherlock dusted off his hands, looking satisfied.

“Thanks,” John said.

Sherlock nodded, dropped a kiss on John’s head, and swept away into his room, his robe flowing out behind him.

John’s mind went blissfully blank. He blinked at where Sherlock had exited the room, and then raised a hand to touch his forehead.

“Huh,” he said, and smiled.

* * *

John was sat down at the dinner table when he heard Sherlock coming down the stairs.

“Hey,” John said as Sherlock billowed in, wearing his dressing gown, hair dark and dripping. “I made pasta,” he added. “Bolognese.”

Sherlock walked over to the fridge and opened the door. “Did you move my things?”

John shuffled around a few pieces of penne before deciding on one and stabbing it with his fork. “Yep,” he said, popping the ending. “I didn’t want it staring at me whenever I opened the fridge.”

“Don’t be ridiculous,” Sherlock said absently. “The eyeballs are in the microwave.”

John sucked in a breath and briefly closed his eyes. “Pasta,” he said firmly, more to himself than to Sherlock.

Sherlock walked over. He stood near the table, not sitting just yet. He narrowed his eyes at the plate, then bent his head down low and sniffed.

“Considering all the other things you’ve tasted before,” John said pleasantly, “I don’t think this will be much of a problem.”

Sherlock hummed thoughtfully. He flicked his eyes up, his face inches from John’s. He smiled. “No, I don’t think so. Thank you, John.”

“Fine,” John said, a little disorientated by the way Sherlock’s cologne wafted out from his wet hair.

Sherlock’s smile changed tones, softening at the edges and spreading to his eyes. He leaned in and pressed his lips to John’s cheek, and then swiftly drew back, pulling out his chair and taking a seat.

John stared at his plate of penne pasta with a newly-arrived flurry of clouds in his mind as Sherlock dug in.

“OK,” he said quietly.

* * *

A client had just come in, bringing with her a flurry of nerves, smoke, and the smell of the Tube. Sherlock claimed boring the minute she had stepped in, and sent her on her way. The next was the same. And the next. And the next. It seemed like the universe didn’t know exactly to do with Sherlock Holmes, and John could quite agree. To an extent, that was.

Sherlock hunched himself into a ball, rocking back and forth in his chair. “Where in the world is Lestrade? I need something. Anything.”

“You could help me wash these dishes,” John called out from the sink.

“Boring!”

John sighed and returned to scrubbing at a particularly-stubborn patch of grease.

Sherlock’s fingers drummed rapidly on the armrest. “John,” he started, and John stopped scrubbing. He recognized that tone of voice.

“Nope.” John looked at his watch. “You’ve been clean for three months, fifteen days, 10 hours, 23 minutes, and… 50 seconds.”

“Exactly. I deserve a reward.”

“24 minutes now,” John said.

Sherlock grumbled something incomprehensible. He really was exceedingly jittery today. John sighed, took a minute to dry his hands on his pants, and then walked over.

Sherlock looked up at John, standing right in front of him. “What?”

John bent down and kissed Sherlock on the forehead, then, before either of them could say anything, he straightened, turned, and headed to his room.

When he ventured back downstairs an hour later, the sink was clean, and the table was cleared. (Relatively. Good enough, he thought.) Sherlock was playing the violin. It was beautiful.

* * *

John sat on the couch, watching some obscure 80s soap opera on the telly. Sherlock was sprawled out like an overgrown house cat next to him.

“Boring,” Sherlock whined.

“You haven’t anything better to do,” John reasoned.

Sherlock huffed, crowded closer, and butted his head up against John’s shoulder—exactly like an overgrown house cat. “I’m bored, John.”

John groaned. “Do something in your mind palace.”

“Like what?”

“I dunno—imagine yourself in a not-boring place.”

John’s eyes were on the telly but he could envision Sherlock’s eye roll. “You don’t understand the intricacies of the mind palace.”

“Can’t say I do,” John said lightly, and, almost like a reflex, an instinct, without trying to—he reached up and carded his fingers through Sherlock’s hair.

He immediately realized what he had done and froze, fingers withdrawing, but Sherlock’s shoulders dropped and his breathing slowed and he practically melted against his touch.

John continued, gently running his fingers through soft black curls. Sherlock hummed happily and turned his head, pressed his lips against a spot in John’s neck.

Pulse point, John thought, and smiled. He dropped down to plant a kiss on the top of Sherlock’s head.

Sherlock closed his eyes, shifting closer.

They sat and watched the telly.

* * *

They were smeared in the blood of a child trafficker. Sherlock’s eyes were wild. Words spilled out of his mouth, one after another, never seeming to stop. His hands gestured, he paced around, swivelling over to point and wave and flutter.

John looked at him. Noticed the shape of his jaw. The curve of his smile. The light in his breath.

“You’re doing that again,” he said. “The showing off.”

Sherlock grinned at him.

“It’s what we do. Show off,” he replied.

John grabbed his shoulders, pulled him in, and kissed him straight on the mouth.

Sherlock’s lips were terribly soft, and he smelled rather (very) nice, and Greg and Sally were watching for sure, and—

Sherlock took John’s face in his hands and kissed him right back.

John thought he heard Greg say something in the background but he wasn’t sure.

He wasn’t sure who pulled back first, but what he did know was that he wanted more. Didn’t think he’d ever wanted anything more.

They looked at each other for a solid ten seconds.

“Alright,” John said, breathy.

Sherlock smiled.

**Author's Note:**

> Late to the party but hi Sherlock fandom!


End file.
